Andrew Sarris

“…. For a time I lost sympathy with the Gere character for simultaneously behaving like a heel and getting self-righteously preachy about it. And for a time I wanted to kick the Debra Winger character for not telling him off. But I must say that when Gere finally did the right thing with boldness and dispatch, there was not a dry eye among all the women in attendance at the screening. The old dreams die hard, and I must report that I once saw the same female tears at a revival of an old Metro movie in which no-good, irresponsible Clark Gable shows up to rescue a somewhat tarnished and somewhat pregnant Jean Harlow from prison. That Gere and Winger can evoke memories of Gable and Harlow is a tribute to the relentlessly grown-up sexuality they have incarnated through their admittedly uneven careers, in an age dominated on screen by childish diversions.”

Andrew Sarris
Village Voice, August 10, 1982